It's been a long time coming, but Nidhogg is finally here. First shown back in 2010, the sword-duelling title has gained recognition in the indie circuit, picking up awards at the Independent Games Festival and IndieCade.

Developed by Messhof, the game excels in a local multiplayer environment because matches often boil down to a cross between tactics and psychology.

Two combatants face off against each other with the objective being to reach the opposite end of the side-scrolling map. Pulling off a kill gives you a precious few seconds to advance before your opponent respawns ahead of you.

The tension comes from how quickly it takes to kill someone, often taking just one hit - be it from a straightforward stab to the chest or a thrown sword connecting. Dive kicks and leg sweeps are also handy moves, as knocking your opponent to the ground will leave them vulnerable to a finishing move.

Nidhogg is unforgiving. A mistimed jump, failure to block or parry, a whiffed stab - it just takes one small mistake to meet death.

As a result, duels can be very tentative, as both players weigh up the options of whether to make the first move or stand their ground.

But there are moments when the pace amps up. You see, if you got the last kill, you're not obligated to kill your foe to progress. Because you have control of the screen, dashing past your opponent is also a viable tactic.

"Though there is plenty of nuance in the controls that skill is still very much a factor, the emphasis on mind games means matches are unpredictably varied."

Here, it becomes a manic mini-battle of its own - one player trying to get as far as they can to swing the match in their favor, the other desperately trying to halt their progress.

It's certainly not uncommon to see matches wildly swing in momentum from one player to the other. One minute, you're on the verge of reaching the finish line, the next you're on the back foot, struggling to regain control as your opponent edges progressively closer to their end of the map.

The other great thing is the fact that aside from movement, Nidhogg only uses two buttons: one to attack and one to jump. The simplicity is part of its charm. There are no special moves or fancy character quirks.

Though there is plenty of nuance in the controls that skill is still very much a factor, the emphasis on mind games means matches are unpredictably varied.

If there is a slight against the local experience, it's that everything surrounding the core game is rather thin.

Mutators, from altering the rules to silly changes like low gravity and turbo mode, don't have much lasting value, and chances are you'll quickly go back to the default, pure settings.

The number of maps is few at just four, but that said, locations are fairly diverse. The mines are claustrophobic, making for wonderfully suspenseful close-up fencing duels, while tall grass covers vast areas of the wilds, affecting your ability to see your opponent.

An offline tournament mode is also included, allowing between three and eight players to compete for bragging rights. It's not an essential addition, but is suited for larger groups.

The lack of extras means Nidhogg may be better experienced in shorter bursts, but the core of it is enjoyable enough that, if you have a like-minded friend or two, you'll likely continue to come back for more.

While Nidhogg is enjoyable locally, it's worth stressing that we found online to be rotten at the time of this review. The developer is still working on ironing out numerous issues, but at present, the matchmaking is unreliable at best.

Despite being informed that there were several people online, the game would sometimes struggle to match us up with another player. On several occasions, we waited at least ten minutes without anything happening.

"With the psychological aspect taken away, playing against the AI gets stale quickly, confirming that going head-to-head with another human is the only way to properly enjoy the title."

Unfortunately, when we finally managed to get into a match, the poor netcode hampered our enjoyment.

Online matches considerably favor the host. The times we were unfortunate not be hosting, we suffered from a great amount of lag and even the occasional rollback.

Stabs and jumps would come out a split-second too slow, often resulting in our death. And kills you think you've executed are reversed when the game re-syncs and shows that the host dealt the fatal blow instead.

Nidhogg is all about one-on-one encounters and relies on precision and timing, so this is really disappointing.

In addition, the single-player is hardly thrilling, as you're tasked with taking on a succession of progressively tougher opponents. With the psychological aspect taken away, playing against the AI gets stale quickly, confirming that going head-to-head with another human is the only way to properly enjoy the game.

Nidhogg is definitely a blast if you have a few friends around, and it's easy to see why it has been hyped up over the last few years.

It does what it sets out to do, providing plenty of thrills and laughs in the process. But if you don't have any buddies nearby who would be into swordfights, it's worth holding off until the online becomes more stable.